{news} New Haven Chapter meeting at NeverEndingBookStore - 812 State Street - Thurs Jan 19 at 7:30 p.m.

Thu Jan 12 22:53:53 EST 2006

Green Party Chapter Meeting

The New Haven Greens will be holding a chapter meeting on Thurs Jan 19 at 7:30pm.

The location will be at:

Never Ending Book Store
812 State Street, New Haven. 

This is next door to St. Stanislaus church, between Eld and Pearl streets.

The agenda will include a presentation by Anstress Farwell of the New Haven Urban Design League concerning developments at Yale/New Haven Hospital and the proposed Cancer Center.

Also present to discuss the Cancer Center will be Gwen Mills of CCNE and CORD.

In addition, Kelly McCarthy and Aaron Gustafson, formerly of the Hamden Greens will be present to discuss the reasons for their resignations from the CT Green Party Executive Committee.

Below are the minutes from the last chapter meeting.
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New HavenReminder: Chapter meeting - Thurs. Jan. 19 at 7:30 p.m. at NeverEndingBookStore - 812 State Street (on the west side, between Pearl and Eld Streets, and across the street from Ralph Ferrucci's apartment, in case you were wondering).

Special guests: Anstress Farwell, Urban Design League, and Gwen Mills, CCNE/CORD, to talk about the Cancer Center and the Hill, followed by conversation with Aaron Gustafson and Kelly McCarthy.

Please join us in this new venue in this new year, and thanks to Roger for inviting us to use the BookStore as a meeting place.

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: allan brison 
  Sent: Thursday, January 12, 2006 3:17 PM
  Subject: [newhavengreens] Chapter meeting - Thurs Jan 19 at NeverEndingBookStore - 812 State Street

  Green Party Meeting - 12/15/05 - Minutes

  First Draft

  Format Note: actions approved by the meeting are shown in Bold Italics.

  Meeting was opened shortly after 7:30. In attendance were:

  Linda Muirhead from DFA

  Bob Bloch

  Robin Schafer

  Charlie Pillsbury

  David Eliscu

  Daniel Sumrall
  Jerry Martin

  Allan Brison
  Mary Anne (arrived late)

  1. Introductions, Review Agenda, Appoint Secretary and Facilitator for Meeting.

  Allan was appointed Secretary and Charlie was appointed Facilitator for meeting.

  2. State Meeting Report (Daniel and Allan)

  State Party Finances. The state party was left some money in a will which has enabled the recent Modified Consensus Procedure workshop and will enable the chapters to receive the money owed by the state due to the Hartford office loans. Our chapter is owed about $1200.

  The state agreed to pay an outstanding debt also in conjunction with the Hartford office.

  Campaign Finance Legislation. The anti-3rd party aspect to this legislation were brought to our attention. A press release will put out on the GP position.

  Candidates for 2006. The state is hoping to run candidates for Governor and other state offices. 

  Next Meeting. The next meeting will be on Dec 27 and will be more of a social meeting than business.

  3. Resignations from State party (David, Allan and others)

  David expressed concern about the recent resignations from the Green Party of two of the three State Co-Chairs, Aaron Gustafson and Kelly McCarthy; and long time member and state delegate to the USGP, Tom Sevigny. 

  There was a difference of opinion as to what Kelly had said in her resignation statement. Allan agreed to provide those present with her statement via email.

  Most present had not seen Tom's explanation post and Allan agreed to provide that as well.

  We agreed that some overtures should be made to Kelly and Aaron. Charlie agreed to invite them to our January meeting.

  4. Report on Ad Hoc meeting to discuss electoral strategy (Daniel, Allan, and Jerry)

  Daniel, Jerry, Allan, and Mary Anne met on Wed (Dec 14), as per last month's chapter meeting, to discuss various aspects of party functioning. Ralph Ferrucci was unable to attend due to his father's illness.

  As we each had a different idea as to what we were meeting for, we neglected to cover what was apparently the main mission, ie, that of planning for our Jan 21 retreat meeting. What we discussed instead were:

  a. New Haven Green's website page

  Jerry and Daniel are working together to develop this page. Aside from general outreach, the importance includes having a place where policies can be stored as such policies are developed. (See next topic). Also, monitoring hits on the website is a good way of determining the effectiveness of our various actions, outreach efforts, letters to media, etc.

  Jerry and Daniel could use help from people with website-creation expertise.

  b. Policy Development Forums

  If the GP is indeed to be a party of issues rather than personalities, it seems evident that we need to develop platform policies. One way to do that and, at the same time, to combine Outreach and Educational objectives, is to have public Policy Development Forums.

  The idea would be to pick a topic, such as City Development Strategy, and to invite several experts to speak on this subject. The meetings would be open to the public and would provide for the public to ask questions of the speakers and to make comments. The speakers would usually represent community organizations with whom we either have, or would like to have, a partnering relationship.

  The GP would take notes on all comments, ask questions ourselves, and then, in private, hash out a GP position on that topic. The positions would be developed by consensus, or possibly by Modified Consensus Procedure (MCP).

  This process would engage the speakers, the organizations they represent, and the public, in helping us to develop such policies. It would serve both educational and outreach objectives.

  c. Media

  The committee feels that the GP would benefit from a much more organized response to media articles. The current situation is that on rare occasion one of us may write a letter to the editor, such as Allan's recent letter in response to Andy Bromage's Register election article; or Daniel's as yet unpublished letter in response to the GP bashing letter in a recent Advocate.

  Ideally we would have several members writing letters and press releases on a much more frequent basis.

  To this end, we suggest that one or more GP members subscribe to the Register and scan it daily for articles that we ought to comment on, and to have designated members ready to put out press releases and write letters.

  This process would work best if there were several people involved who could bounce ideas off each other. 

  It would be good if there were multiple responses, each covering a different aspect of the issue involved, and each one clearly stated as coming from a GP member.

  d. informal meet-ups

  The committee feels that our current chapter meetings, emphasizing business aspects, should not be expected to serve as an outreach tool. Chapter meetings have not proven effective for inspiring new members.

  Nor are chapter meetings ideal for developing new ideas. This can require more informal discussions with less time constraints.

  To address both these points, the committee feels that it would be good to have regular informal meetings in a public place. 

  The chapter, as a whole, agreed to the idea of these meetings. The first one will be at Book Traders, on Chapel near York (??) on Tuesday, Jan 3 at 7pm. Allan and Jerry are committed to being present. The goal is to hold these meetings weekly.

  5. CORD Rally (Robin, Daniel, Jerry and Allan)

  Robin, Allan, Daniel, Jerry, and Mary Anne participated in the Rally which was on Tues (12/13/05).

  The event consisted of a march from Career High to the Hospital for a rally. About 400 people turned out despite the extreme cold (wind chill around 0 degrees F.) Both the march and the rally were extremely spirited.

  The Green Party was responsible for turning out, at last count, 23 people to the rally. There may have been more because the winter clothing made recognition difficult and there were people coming that I didn't know.

  Robin expressed concern that the rally had been too narrowly focused on the unionization issue at the expense of the other CORD issues (affordable housing, affordable health care, environment concerns, traffic and parking, tax base erosion, etc).

  The chapter decided to have Allan address this issue with Scott Marks and to report back at the next meeting and by email.

  6. **David's alternative development suggestion (David)

  7. NE Greenhouse Gas Initiative (Robin)

  Robin reported that Governor Rell has announced that she will sign on to the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). Robin and Daniel agreed to put out a press release to praise her for that action.

  As Mitzi has pointed out in her recent posts there is an important caveat here. If greenhouse gas emission reduction is achieved by reliance on nuclear energy, as the Republicans are trying to push, it will be a dangerous, pernicious, and self-defeating policy.

  8. New Haven Democracy Fund proposal for Public Financing of Municipal Elections (Charlie)

  The New Haven Democracy Fund has developed an excellent proposal for campaign finance reform for municipal elections. Daniel Weeks, a Yale grad student has been prominent in this endeavor. This plan does NOT discriminate against 3rd party or independent candidates as the recently passed state legislation does. (see next topic.)

  Up until now, the plan could not be implemented without enabling legislation from the state. This enabling legislation was passed as a part of the new state campaign finance reform bill. This means that NHDF proposal could be immediately effective.

  Charlie proposed and the chapter agreed to have Charlie, on behalf of the chapter, join the NHDF coalition and sign on to a statement urging the Board of Alderman and the Mayor to adopt this plan.

  9. Green Party challenge to the state Campaign Finance Reform legislation. (Charlie)

  The state has just passed much needed and sweeping Campaign Finance Reform legislation. This is being hailed around the country by Common Cause and others as a landmark bill, the first time any state legislature has tackled this issue.

  The bill, however, royally screws 3rd party and independent candidates, in effect making public financing only available to Dems and Repugs.

  Charlie proposed and the chapter agreed to place on the agenda for the next State GP meeting a proposal to fight to amend this legislation, or, if necessary, to join in a law suit against the anti-3rd party clauses.

  10. Exploratory Discussion with non-GP candidates. (Allan)

  At the last chapter meeting, Allan and Daniel and Ralph were going to seek meetings with ward 23 independent candidate, Clarissa Brown, and Guilty Party candidate for mayor, Leslie Blateau. 

  These meetings have not yet taken place due to Ralph's intense exam schedule followed closely by his father's illness, and to Daniel's judgment that we should wait to talk to Clarissa. (Daniel lives in her ward and met with her during her campaign.)

  11. Election Post-Mortem (David)

  David suggested and the chapter agreed to set up a special meeting with Eric Brown to discuss the mayoral election. Charlie volunteered to contact Eric.

  12. Announcements and Coming Events (various)

  -Jan 3, Tuesday, 7pm - First of our planned series of informal meet-ups at Book Traders.

  -Jan 19, Thursday, 7:30pm - NHGP chapter meeting 

  -Jan 21: Retreat to discuss Electoral Strategies for 2006-2007 (details to come). (DATE HAS CHANGED - TBD)

  *-(Robin) care2 air quality EJN.

  -(Bob) Nelson Lichtenstein who has written a good book on Wal-Mart will be at Yale soon (details to come).

  13. Adjournment

  The meeting was adjourned at 9:15pm.
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